Hardline socialist who will write their manifesto
A KEY figure behind Labour’s election manifesto is a hardline socialist previously suspended from the party for urging voters to back anarchist group Class War instead.
Andrew Fisher, 36, claimed that was a misunderstood joke.
But he has more trouble disassociating himself from his recent calls for Trident to be scrapped, for MI5 to be disbanded, for police to be stripped of weapons, and for 50 per cent tax on pay over £60,000 a year.
The policy chief for Jeremy Corbyn has also spoken out against using drone strikes to kill terrorists.
He described Tony Blair as a ‘scumbag for hire to scumbags’, former home secretary Jack Straw as a ‘vile git’, the party’s previous shadow Cabinet as ‘the most abject collection of absolute s****’, and celebrated the downfall of former shadow chancellor Ed Balls.
Mr Fisher, who has worked as an activist and campaigner since leaving education, was never shy with his radical views during his long-term association with mMarxists and communists, which led to him writing a series of columns in the Communist Party’s Morning Star newspaper.
Now he has been named as the central man in the production of the manifesto which Labour optimists hope can sweep Mr Corbyn to victory – in spite of all opinion polls suggesting the party leader is seen as an ineffectual socialist with pie-in-the-sky ideals.
The political background of adviser Mr Fisher, who is on a salary of at least £56,000, suggests he is unlikely to produce a manifesto that will
‘Wants to make Britain less safe’
appeal to the centre ground. Originally from Worthing, West Sussex, the father of one lives with his partner in Croydon, south London.
He worked as a parliamentary researcher for six years, becoming close to John McDonnell, the avowedly socialist future shadow chancellor, and in 2006 co-founded the Marx- influenced Left Economics Advisory Panel.
Mr Fisher has also worked as a political officer for the Public and Commercial Services union, was a leading figure on the Labour Representation Committee, and two years ago was a signatory to the radical demands of the ill-fated Socialist Campaign for a Labour Victory. Thanks to his Morning Star columns, a book he has written about the financial crash from a socialist perspective, and a series of tweets he sent, before later deleting, his farLeft views became well known to Labour activists.
Eyebrows were raised when Mr Corbyn appointed him as an adviser in October 2015. Within weeks he was suspended for a tweet during that year’s General Election in which he seemed to call on Labour supporters in Croydon to vote not for the party’s Emily Benn, granddaughter of Tony Benn, but for Class War’s John Bigger.
The seat was won by the Tories. Mr Fisher was later returned to his role at the heart of Corbyn’s Labour, insisting the tweet was a satirical joke. He said he ‘did not support Class War in any way, let alone in an election’.
Last night Tory MP James Cleverly said: ‘All you need to know about the man writing Labour’s manifesto is that he wants to make our country less safe.’